Danish Jazz Pianist Nikolaj Bentzon

seiitoha

New member
Thanks to living in the McLuhan's envisioned-age, I'm fortunately enough to know and listen to a lot of old & new great Danish Jazz, from B.Rostvold B.Jaedig, B.Axen, E.Moseholm, A.Botschinsky, NHOP, T.Clausen, N.L.Doky, M.Vinding, C.Dahl, J.Anderskov (definitely I've listened to more from danish jazz musicians, but can't remember their names now).
However, I can find little information about Pianist Nikolaj Bentzon's early Olufsen acoustic piano trio cd works( Nexus, Between Us, Triskelos & Pianoforte).

Is anyone familiar with his music?
 

OLDUDE

New member
Hi siitoha,
Welcome to the Forum.
I'm very interested in learning about European jazz and I plan to track down the Danish musicians you have listed.
Spotify-my usual source of new jazz players has let me down with Nilolaj Bentzon.
Can you suggest any other source?

Cheers John
 
teddy

teddy

Duckmeister
Thanks Margaret. Not really my thing, although he is obviously an accomplished pianist.

teddy
 

seiitoha

New member
Hi everyone, thanks for your replies.

For N.Bentzon, I found his official site http://nikolajbentzon.com/
, but unfortunately there is no specific reference or info to his early olufsen outputs. (btw, he is the son of Danish contemporary composer Niels Viggo Bentzon).
His projects are acoustic piano trio & solo, electric funk group, w/vocal and w/orchestra. I can see he is a busy musician.

On youtube, many videos are found. They're uploaded by mr.bentzon himself. 2 good tunes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYU5nRl_eYk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7cKwqTW9VQ

(thanks Margaret for the link, the live is funky & crisp)

Most of his playing in acoustic format seems to be in a bop way rather than in b.evans one, inclining to a fast swigin or busy, intensive side(not so heavy though).
I personally prefer modern-to-contemporary jazz(modal, evans, ecm, brooklyn school, ...etc), but it's fun to listen to. I'll keep looking for his olufsen cds.


For other danish jazz musicians, I can find lots of samples on amazon & itunes and videos on youtube. some choices:

older tunes by B.Axen B.Jaedig A.Botschinsky, NHOP, A.Riel....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1nkJaKBUN4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhJyY_Xwpbs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1jv3nbt5tA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbSt7gFYJ9Q


Niels Lan Doky's Misty Dawn(w NHOP & A.Riel, including beautiful tunes),
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXMjjzR2Et4
--------------- French Ballads(self-explanatory)
http://www.amazon.com/French-Ballads/dp/B001BHPC72/

Carsten Dahl's Sign(dreamy echoing world)
[URL]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkDesHj9P2I,[/URL]

Mad Vinding's Kingdom(w/E.Pieranunzi emotinal melodies), http://www.amazon.com/The-Kingdom-Where-Nobody-Dies/dp/B000QQRR7W/,

Jacob Anderskov's Even Worse(edgier than other fellows, abstract beauty like paul bley),
http://www.amazon.com/Even-Worse/dp/B001P5VI7I

I can't find sound files of these, but I recommend if you don't know.
Allan Botschinsky's Night(you can feel breeze & winds).
Thomas Clausen's She Touched Me(evans esque trio).
 
JHC

JHC

Chief assistant to the assistant chief
Thanks for all the links but personally I am looking for D/Ls
 
teddy

teddy

Duckmeister
I liked the Carsten Dahl link and will certainly try some more of his work. Do you like Esbjorn Svensson? I think it would be your sort of music.

teddy
 

seiitoha

New member
Thanks Teddy for your interest in the Carsten Dahl's music. His "sign" is not obsolete jazz, but one of the new living jazz. Jazz still has a possibility.

Yep, the late Esbjorn Svensson is my favorite artist in contemporary music. I love his contrapuntal euphoria. I've followed him since around 1998 when the EST was featured on BBC or SR P2(swedish radio). He was totally an epoch making figure. As NY Times said before "not what jazz was, but what jazz can be...", I saw a break through to the future in him. Their last and final album was also a beggining of new depature, totally improvised music recorded in Australia. I think the place was symbolic because new kind of improvised music static, calm, but gradually metamorphosing in time & space has being created there around 2000 by such artists as Necks, Joel Harrison, Walter Lampe and Alister Spence. I just wish I could listen to next evolution of EST.

I am still so sad about his tragic & unexpected death(reminded me a bit of too early passing of Jan Johansson). I've heard that Keith Jarrett once referred to him that he was in the middle of making his originality or something like that. I considered him to be an legendary musician since Jarrett (maybe someone disagree because of his pop-ness and accessibility) in the sence of the music taking us to the next dimention of our mind or spirit, where the technique doesn't matter very much.

Sorry for distracting the initial thread theme....
 
JHC

JHC

Chief assistant to the assistant chief
seiitoha said:
I considered him to be an legendary musician since Jarrett (maybe someone disagree because of his pop-ness and accessibility) in the sence of the music taking us to the next dimention of our mind or spirit, where the technique doesn't matter very much.

Sorry for distracting the initial thread theme....
Click to expand...

Re the the underlined text. I would be very interested if you would expand this a little :) in particular the bit about technique?
 
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